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150: Mastering LinkedIn: Building Brand Ambassadors and Business Networks with Brenda Meller · Imperfect Marketing

• 0:28
  Speaker 1: Hello and welcome back to another episode of Imperfect Marketing Today.
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: I am excited to welcome Beth back.
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: I think she was one of my first five guests on the podcast.
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: Things have changed a lot, but welcome to Brenda Meller.
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: Thank you so much for joining me, brenda.
• 0:45
  Speaker 2: Hey, kendra, I'm excited to be back and thank you so much for inviting me back to be with you again.
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: So Brenda is amazing.
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: She is the go-to LinkedIn person that I send everybody to.
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: Actually, I recently met with a friend of mine who started her own business and the first thing I told her was go follow Brenda and connect with her on LinkedIn because she has so much great advice and information to share about leveraging LinkedIn to grow your business, to start a business, to just grow your profile.
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: Overall, you are a LinkedIn coach for solopreneurs, job seekers and business professionals.
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: You do team training, you do professional speaking, you are a podcaster, author, rescue dog, mom and, of course, you love Pi, which we all know for the most part.
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: If anybody follows you, what made you focus on LinkedIn?
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: I know I've asked you this before, but I think it's just very interesting.
• 1:39
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and for me, I was always anti-social media back in the day and when I was like she's a LinkedIn person yeah, I am, but follow me along here Back in remember 2002, 2003, even earlier than that, everybody was on this Facebook bandwagon.
• 1:53
  Speaker 2: I got to get on Facebook and I remember my college friends at the time trying to get me on and I was like why do I want to go on this community where people that I used to go to high school with are coming out of the woodwork and ex-boyfriends and things?
• 2:04
  Speaker 2: I'm like I don't want that and that's something that I really want to do.
• 2:06
  Speaker 2: And then LinkedIn came onto the scene and I remember it was somebody that I worked with, who worked in the field of marketing which was where my professional background is who I really respected and trusted, and she had sent me one of those LinkedIn invitations I'd like to add you to my professional network on LinkedIn, which was the standard invite at the time.
• 2:24
  Speaker 2: And I remember seeing her at a work meeting and I said, erica, what is this LinkedIn thing?
• 2:27
  Speaker 2: And I keep hearing about it.
• 2:29
  Speaker 2: I kept getting invitations at this point and she told me about it and what I liked was that it was a purely professional focus, it wasn't a social media focus and I got into it.
• 2:39
  Speaker 2: I figured out as an introvert at heart and I will always be an introvert, kendra but as an introvert, I found that there was a way that I could connect with people from across the world in different communities and, you know, I just developed a knack for it.
• 2:52
  Speaker 2: And one thing led to another.
• 2:54
  Speaker 2: I use it in the height of the recession in 2008 to find a new job and I realized it was going to change the job search market.
• 3:00
  Speaker 2: In my next corporate role after that, I realized you know the time social media was still growing and I had to be in charge of social media.
• 3:08
  Speaker 2: So at this point I was on Facebook.
• 3:09
  Speaker 2: I finally came around, but LinkedIn was always my top network and I always just I've been self-taught and I really just loved the platform.
• 3:18
  Speaker 2: I started becoming that person that people would say Brenda knows what she's doing there, maybe she can help us out with this.
• 3:24
  Speaker 2: One thing led to another turned into speaking engagements, turned into building my personal brand, turned into a side hustle and then, when the universe nudged me forward and I decided what I wanted to do next, I decided just to lean into this as a full business, and that's what I do now.
• 3:39
  Speaker 1: That's awesome.
• 3:39
  Speaker 1: I love that story and I love how you were anti social media for a while there, because I do think that social media does create opportunities for us, but it's not the end all be all for everything that we do, and I think that that's important.
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: So recently I had a guest on the podcast.
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: She is a marketing strategist and the only social media network she has is LinkedIn, and I love it because I've been using her as an example.
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: I'm like, if she can do it, so can you.
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: When it comes to narrowing down your social media investment, I'll call it right, because we're all limited with time and money.
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: Right and time, I think more, even a lot of times than money.
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: But being so resource constrained, why would you recommend, or would you recommend, that somebody focus on one platform?
• 4:32
  Speaker 2: That's a great question and yeah, there's 24 hours in a day.
• 4:35
  Speaker 2: I do not get more, kendra.
• 4:37
  Speaker 2: You do not get more.
• 4:38
  Speaker 2: It might seem like we get more because we're more.
• 4:40
  Speaker 2: Maybe we're more strategic or focused about our efforts and people see us online, they feel like all the time.
• 4:46
  Speaker 2: But it's intentional and my response to that is if you only want to be on one platform, that's fine.
• 4:52
  Speaker 2: You don't have to be on any platforms at all.
• 4:54
  Speaker 2: But if you choose to be on one platform, choose the platform where your audience can be found.
• 4:59
  Speaker 2: I think that's an important point.
• 5:01
  Speaker 2: So, typically for business professionals B2B you know LinkedIn is the space for that.
• 5:07
  Speaker 2: Linkedin is the top professional networking site.
• 5:10
  Speaker 2: There's a couple other sites that are out there, but LinkedIn is really the top one that's known by most people.
• 5:14
  Speaker 2: But there are some people that are more in the consumer space and it might fit better for them to be on Facebook or Instagram than on LinkedIn.
• 5:23
  Speaker 2: Now I would always still say, kendra, at least at bare minimum, set up your LinkedIn profile, put some basic information, redirect people, let them know that you're active on Instagram, because there are some people that are only on LinkedIn, that are not active anywhere else, and if they're looking for you, if they're thinking of doing business with you, they might still look you up there.
• 5:42
  Speaker 2: So you know, I think it's fine to be active on one.
• 5:45
  Speaker 2: Know where your audience is is the key point there.
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: Yeah, Well, and I've been hearing more and more mentioning what you're talking about more and more people shedding all of the other social media networks and really just being on LinkedIn.
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: I think I've got three clients that are only on LinkedIn.
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: They got rid of their Facebook and Instagram profiles.
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: I've got two clients that are nonprofits and they've got at least three board members that are not on Facebook or Instagram.
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: They're only on LinkedIn, because one of them told me at Lestrom yeah.
• 6:21
  Speaker 1: So is that?
• 6:24
  Speaker 1: Have you been finding it's easier, more often, to start reaching people on LinkedIn?
• 6:30
  Speaker 2: Well, you know, it really depends on who the person is and are they active on LinkedIn?
• 6:35
  Speaker 2: And there's even a way that you can look at profiles.
• 6:38
  Speaker 2: I was doing this with a client this morning.
• 6:39
  Speaker 2: We were poking around a profile determining who to invite to connect, and there's clues that you can see to determine whether or not the person is active on LinkedIn.
• 6:47
  Speaker 2: One is number of connections, and LinkedIn will show you their number of connections up to 500, and then it'll say 500 plus.
• 6:53
  Speaker 2: You can scroll down to their activity feed section and see how many followers that they have, and it's a significant number, you know 500 above 1000 or above.
• 7:00
  Speaker 2: They're probably active on LinkedIn.
• 7:02
  Speaker 2: You can also see in their activity feed when was the last time that they posted or when was the last time they commented on somebody else's post.
• 7:09
  Speaker 2: In addition, at the top of their profile, next to their name, you can see a green circle, and I always forget, I think the green solid circle means they're active on desktop right now.
• 7:19
  Speaker 2: The hollowed out green circle means mobile app.
• 7:22
  Speaker 2: It might be one or the other, but basically it means they're on LinkedIn.
• 7:25
  Speaker 2: They at least have an app or an instance of it that's open right now.
• 7:27
  Speaker 2: I think that's one way, as if you're trying to reach people, let's figure out first of all, are they even active on LinkedIn?
• 7:34
  Speaker 2: Now, if I visit a profile and the person's got 11 connections they've never posted, they've never commented, I could probably guess correctly that they're not going to accept my invite.
• 7:44
  Speaker 2: So hopefully that helps out.
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: Yeah, no, I think that that's a great way to think about it and the look at it and to do a little investigation so that you're not wasting any invitations right as you're working to connect and build your network.
• 7:57
  Speaker 1: So let's talk about employees.
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: So some of us have teams, some of us have independent contractors that work with us, and I do think that there is a difference.
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: I know you've got at least one intern.
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: I do, yeah, one intern right now All right, and they can be ambassadors for your brand and leverage LinkedIn, but I know a lot of people are very particular about what they share, so how can companies, entrepreneurs, work with their teams to get them to become more brand ambassadors, especially on LinkedIn?
• 8:40
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's a great question and the interesting thing is that people are everybody's a little bit different with regards to how they treat social media and their ownership of it, and what they post and what they don't post and whatnot.
• 8:51
  Speaker 2: I always tell people LinkedIn is a professional networking platform, so let's think about that.
• 8:55
  Speaker 2: First, professional networking so by definition, that means it's linked to your profession.
• 9:02
  Speaker 2: So I get when people say and I had a client this the other day we were having a conversation and she said you know, I don't want to have a branded header with my company information because this is my profile, this is not their profile.
• 9:12
  Speaker 2: And I said, yes, but let me just give you something to think about.
• 9:16
  Speaker 2: People are affiliating you with your company, regardless if you put a branded header up there or not.
• 9:22
  Speaker 2: And specifically, if people are working in the field of social media and marketing, it looks good if you're promoting the company on social media, in your header and in other places on your profile, and if you're leading those efforts and even, let's say, in the example of a solo preneur, encouraging people and I'll use the case of my intern, julia I've said, hey, I'd love it if you would be open to putting a branded Mellor marketing header on your profile and she's working in marketing and social media and I've said you know you can use the same thing I have in my header image right now, or you can create your own, and she's an intern.
• 9:58
  Speaker 2: She loves developing art and graphics.
• 10:00
  Speaker 2: I said, create your own version of it and I'd be happy to review it and approve it for you.
• 10:04
  Speaker 2: If there's folks that are listening or thinking about this approach, what I like to do is give let's give them a header image library.
• 10:11
  Speaker 2: Here are four to six images to choose from, and it's almost like when we go to the movie theaters, Kendra, nowadays.
• 10:17
  Speaker 2: You know, we get our empty cup and then we go up to the drink dispenser and we get to choose the flavor that we want, instead of saying I want the frozen Coke or, you know, dr Pepper, and they fill the cup for us.
• 10:28
  Speaker 2: We get to choose our own and I think we feel like it's a little bit more ours because we made it.
• 10:33
  Speaker 2: You know, same way with a LinkedIn header if you give people here's four to six images to choose from, you can choose the one that you like and then maybe quarterly, sending out an email to your team just reminding them.
• 10:43
  Speaker 2: Hey, if you're open to refreshing your header, we've got a couple new images that are available to you.
• 10:48
  Speaker 2: They're on the intranet.
• 10:49
  Speaker 2: Here's the instructions to add them to the profile.
• 10:52
  Speaker 2: So I think sometimes we need to invite employees in and not make it like it's a requirement, you know, but using words like if you're open to doing so, we'd love if you could add a LinkedIn branded header to your profile and then explaining the why.
• 11:07
  Speaker 2: By doing so, it helps to support the brand, the company, I mean.
• 11:12
  Speaker 2: Sometimes I even jokingly, in team trainings, I'll say it supports your paycheck.
• 11:15
  Speaker 2: You know, when you're supporting your company, your brand, that's supporting your paycheck as well.
• 11:18
  Speaker 2: And for the company, I mean when you can get more people embracing your brand, embracing your company, what you're really doing is you're creating brand ambassadors and they're all even even not even by posting, just by having branding on their LinkedIn profile, they're helping to get the message out there about your company.
• 11:37
  Speaker 1: So if somebody was, if a company was being asked by an employee and said, hey, yes, I would like to, per, I would like to start leveraging LinkedIn more.
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: What do you recommend people share with their employees?
• 11:52
  Speaker 1: Should they be doing their own posts?
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: Should they be sharing from the company page?
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: Should they be sharing from other employees?
• 11:59
  Speaker 2: Yeah, all of the above.
• 12:00
  Speaker 2: It's funny when you say these things.
• 12:02
  Speaker 2: I mean, would I like to see folks doing on?
• 12:05
  Speaker 2: Linkedin is a blend of different types of posts, and you probably know these people too, kendra, that the only thing that they ever post is about their company and their salesy posts.
• 12:13
  Speaker 2: It's one sales promotion after another after another.
• 12:15
  Speaker 2: Eventually you start to tune them out.
• 12:17
  Speaker 2: But if you see someone in comparison where they do a repost from their company page and they're promoting an upcoming event or a product or service, and then the next post it's a picture of them with their dog and they talk about working from home or working in a hybrid environment, and then the next post it's an industry article about the evolution of social media and Twitter becoming X and all these other things.
• 12:38
  Speaker 2: It's kind of a blend of things and then, intermixed with that is company page posts.
• 12:43
  Speaker 2: You have a higher likelihood of keeping your audience engaged specifically your ideal target audience, as who we're trying to post for, if you're doing a blend of these different things on there.
• 12:54
  Speaker 2: But I also work with executives and there was a gentleman I was on the call with last week.
• 12:57
  Speaker 2: He's in the C-suite for his company.
• 13:00
  Speaker 2: He doesn't have time to post three times a week, and all this and I said no, we'd expect you to.
• 13:05
  Speaker 2: So for those folks, I say here's the easy way out Go to your company page, find a recent post.
• 13:11
  Speaker 2: When you click on repost, it's the little arrows that are on there.
• 13:13
  Speaker 2: You get two options.
• 13:14
  Speaker 2: One is repost Just click on that and that just it's a straight repost to your home page.
• 13:18
  Speaker 2: The other one is repost with your thoughts.
• 13:21
  Speaker 2: That's a pretty easy technique as well, but now it gives you the opportunity for adding some setup text as you're sharing it out.
• 13:29
  Speaker 2: So really, kendra, it's not a one size fits all approach.
• 13:32
  Speaker 2: I think it depends on the individual, the level that they're at, how much activity they want to have on LinkedIn.
• 13:38
  Speaker 2: But I hope what's coming out here is you want to give people choices and I think you want to give them some guidance, because the biggest thing is that you know people are very nervous about what to post on LinkedIn.
• 13:49
  Speaker 2: Is the company okay with me doing this?
• 13:51
  Speaker 2: Is the company okay if I like my coworkers posts and if I add a comment, or do they see that as like cannibalism?
• 13:58
  Speaker 2: We're just talking to ourselves?
• 13:59
  Speaker 2: No, that's a good thing, and just so you know it's a good thing for the platform when you're interacting with your coworkers.
• 14:03
  Speaker 2: It shows a strong culture and it helps to support the algorithm.
• 14:07
  Speaker 2: But I think giving them permission, giving them some guidelines and giving them some some why behind it can be helpful as well.
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: Do you recommend that companies have training on LinkedIn so that people have a good understanding and feel more comfortable with what they're posting?
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: Because I do find often with my clients and I don't know what to post.
• 14:29
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I think I.
• 14:30
  Speaker 2: You know it depends on the scenario in the situation.
• 14:32
  Speaker 2: Usually, if people are like should we have training, I like to ask them questions before, like what are you doing now?
• 14:38
  Speaker 2: Who is leading those efforts?
• 14:40
  Speaker 2: What are your goals as it relates to LinkedIn?
• 14:43
  Speaker 2: Is it lead generation?
• 14:44
  Speaker 2: Is it brand visibility?
• 14:45
  Speaker 2: Who's the owner or champion for it on LinkedIn?
• 14:49
  Speaker 2: Is this something that we can do?
• 14:51
  Speaker 2: Like a train the trainer, like I can show you what to do and then you go and implement it from your team.
• 14:56
  Speaker 2: Sometimes, what happens, though, is like I remember I used to tell my son you know, you should.
• 15:00
  Speaker 2: You need to eat better, you need to drink more water, you need to get more sleep.
• 15:03
  Speaker 2: And he'd be like yeah, yeah, yeah, he won't listen to me, but then we'll go to the doctors and he's like I'm not feeling good and the doctors like well, you should eat better, you should drink more water and you need to get more sleep.
• 15:13
  Speaker 2: And then my son would come home going cash, mom, can we stop at the fruit market on the way home?
• 15:17
  Speaker 2: And, by the way, I need to drink more water and get to bed earlier.
• 15:20
  Speaker 2: And I'm like I've been telling you this all along.
• 15:22
  Speaker 2: So sometimes the person who is the champion for social media, who's leading the efforts in-house your employees, won't listen to you because they're like a family member to them.
• 15:30
  Speaker 2: So sometimes bringing in an outside expert to kind of launch them up, get them some initial training, then, just like the doctor, they'll listen to you on more of an ongoing basis.
• 15:41
  Speaker 2: So it really does depend on the scenario.
• 15:43
  Speaker 1: Okay, so I work with a lot of nonprofits and a lot of volunteers that they have on their teams board members, boards of directors, things like that that are very passionate about the mission of the organization.
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: But again, they're volunteers, they're board members, they don't have a ton of time.
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: What do you think about creating I don't know a monthly or weekly repository of things that they could share, like sort of copy and paste?
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: Or how would you help people that are Strap for time but want to help and make a difference?
• 16:23
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's a great question.
• 16:23
  Speaker 2: This is one thing I've done with my clients in the past is determine the frequency Maybe it's a one-th of a month, or maybe it's a weekly an email, you know, sending it out to them and say here's our featured LinkedIn post for ABC Foundation for the week, here's what the post is about and here's what we'd like you to do.
• 16:41
  Speaker 2: You know, one click on this link to go to the post.
• 16:43
  Speaker 2: So let's make it super easy for them.
• 16:45
  Speaker 2: Kendra, the technique I like to do is like marketing on a silver platter.
• 16:48
  Speaker 2: I'm going to serve it up exactly for you and I give you step-by-step instructions.
• 16:53
  Speaker 2: Because board members are busy, sometimes they are a little bit more experience rich and not as tech savvy or not as social media savvy, so I want to make it super easy in terms of the instructions.
• 17:02
  Speaker 2: So, step one visit the post, give it a like or a reaction and add a comment that helps by showing people that are followers of the page that we have in engaged community.
• 17:12
  Speaker 2: Step two click on repost and you can either do a straight repost or you can do repost with your thoughts and explaining the benefits of doing both of those.
• 17:21
  Speaker 2: And then step three might be.
• 17:24
  Speaker 2: Click on the little paper airplane icon where you can message it to someone.
• 17:27
  Speaker 2: Maybe that post is something that you just had a conversation with someone with on the topic, or it's about a charity event and you're looking for gifts for your auction and you can message it to someone saying hey, kendra, here's the link if you want to donate that coaching package for our silent auction.
• 17:44
  Speaker 2: So, surfing that up and, depending on the organization, it might be once a month or once every other week here's our featured post of the week and letting them know the instructions on how to share that out, I certainly think you can create like a post library for these people, but why wouldn't you use the content that's already created?
• 18:03
  Speaker 2: I think let's make it easier on you and let's make it easy on them.
• 18:08
  Speaker 2: What will happen over time?
• 18:09
  Speaker 2: You'll get some people not a lot, but some people will do what you said and when they do that, you want to like them, you know.
• 18:16
  Speaker 2: React to them, message them, email them back.
• 18:18
  Speaker 2: Hey, thanks, george, for helping to support that In your next board meeting, maybe make it an agenda item just to say, hey, we've been sending out these emails.
• 18:26
  Speaker 2: I want to give some kudos to George and Juanita and you know, carol for engaging.
• 18:31
  Speaker 2: I like give them the spotlight we always want to like give them attention in the whole group, right?
• 18:35
  Speaker 2: Because then everybody's going to be like George, wait a minute, hey, juanita, they call it, give you a shout out.
• 18:40
  Speaker 2: Executives are not much different than all of us.
• 18:43
  Speaker 2: They like to be recognized and praised and, as your earlier point, they're really passionate about the organization in the community.
• 18:50
  Speaker 2: So sometimes giving them acknowledgement that what they're doing, by responding to your emails and taking action, is the right thing, I think can help to reward that behavior and get more of it.
• 19:01
  Speaker 1: I love that because people really want things to be as easy as possible.
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: We just don't have enough time.
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: We're just inundated with emails and social media posts and phone calls and everything else that goes with it, right.
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: And so as we look to help other people, help us, we need to make it as easy as possible, and I think that that goes for employees too.
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: So if there's an important launch or an important new service or you launch it, even a new website, while it's not necessarily newsworthy that you launched a new website, you can still get people excited about it and checking it out and saying, hey, congratulations.
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: But you have to make it easy for them.
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: Even your team, even your employees, make it easy on them, right.
• 19:48
  Speaker 2: And give them permission.
• 19:49
  Speaker 2: I think that's something we sometimes don't think about.
• 19:51
  Speaker 2: Well, if they wanted to, they would share it.
• 19:54
  Speaker 2: No, not always, because I think sometimes employees feel like, unless my manager or my boss or the marketing department asks me to do it, I'm not going to.
• 20:02
  Speaker 2: And I think some people even get a little bit skeptical about being active on LinkedIn because they see it as a job search site.
• 20:10
  Speaker 2: And that's one important point I always try to stress to people is that LinkedIn is a professional networking site.
• 20:15
  Speaker 2: It's used more for professional networking than it is used by job seekers, and I think there's some confusion because in the beginning that's how LinkedIn kind of marketed themselves as a job search site.
• 20:26
  Speaker 2: There is a jobs tab and if you even look in the app store, it says professional networking and job site.
• 20:33
  Speaker 2: So like jobs is like baked into their description.
• 20:36
  Speaker 2: But if we as company owners and managers and we as marketing professionals empower people and inform them and give them permission, we want you to be active on LinkedIn and here are specifically the things that we want you to do and why and I think by giving them permission, you'll empower them for the lifetime of their careers.
• 20:57
  Speaker 1: So retention has been an issue, I think, for a lot of employers, because either they're requiring people to go back in the office or there's another opportunity, and so people have been moving around a little bit.
• 21:09
  Speaker 1: Does being active on LinkedIn?
• 21:14
  Speaker 1: Do you feel that there's any downsides for employers if people are going to be recruited away from them?
• 21:21
  Speaker 2: If that's a concern, that's a really great question, and there's a quote and I wish I could remember it verbatim, but it's something along the lines of what if we train them and they leave?
• 21:30
  Speaker 2: And the flip side of that is what if we don't and they stay Right.
• 21:34
  Speaker 2: So I think there's a missed opportunity by not inviting people to participate on LinkedIn and give them guidelines and give them instructions and bring them in.
• 21:42
  Speaker 2: And what you'll find as an organization is that the larger the organization, you'll find more people that are like your very heavy LinkedIn users, your brand ambassadors.
• 21:53
  Speaker 2: You know who they are because they're always liking your posts.
• 21:55
  Speaker 2: They're always re-sharing from the company page.
• 21:57
  Speaker 2: Let's empower those brand ambassadors and let's maybe even bring them in.
• 22:01
  Speaker 2: Sometimes Maybe we do a Meet the Team Monday feature and we feature them in on the post.
• 22:06
  Speaker 2: What you'll find is that when you start to embrace people and make LinkedIn training a part of your training and development efforts, you're making people feel like they're a more cohesive part of your team.
• 22:19
  Speaker 2: You're not just doing this job, but you're also representing the company on LinkedIn.
• 22:25
  Speaker 2: When I do training, it's always funny that you bring this up, because it's always something that I address.
• 22:29
  Speaker 2: I address it in training and I will tell people your management has brought me in to train you on LinkedIn.
• 22:35
  Speaker 2: They will not think that you're looking for a job if you get more active.
• 22:39
  Speaker 2: They wouldn't have brought me in if they would think that that was a concern, so that is not a concern, so let's set it off to the side.
• 22:45
  Speaker 2: I'm not here to train you on how to find a job on LinkedIn.
• 22:48
  Speaker 2: I'm here to train you on how to use LinkedIn more effectively.
• 22:51
  Speaker 2: So I think sometimes we need to like clear the air or talk about the elephant in the room.
• 22:55
  Speaker 2: You know with regards to that, but I think the reality is with the organization.
• 23:02
  Speaker 2: If you're treating your employees right, if you've got them in the right fit, the right role, if you're bringing them into strategic discussions about the future of the company and if you're giving them opportunities to grow in your career, you really shouldn't have that worry about.
• 23:16
  Speaker 2: Well, what if they get active and somebody recruits them off the platform?
• 23:19
  Speaker 2: Right?
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, if they're going to leave, they're going to leave, right?
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, them being active and gaining you exposure as a brand isn't necessarily going to be necessarily the item that gets them over the hill there.
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: So, yeah, I mean, I don't think it should factor into people's thought process, because you really do want to make sure that the word gets out about your company and what you offer and the difference that you make, and a lot of times sometimes it's the people you know that really do make a difference to your customers and clients.
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: And having your people share about it and share about your company and trends and information, I think is always a positive.
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: So, thank you so much, brenda.
• 24:06
  Speaker 1: I think this is going to give people a lot of food for thought on what they're sharing on LinkedIn.
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: Again, not all sales posts.
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: I feel like I'm a broken record with that.
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: It's the 80-20 rule, right?
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: So 80%.
• 24:21
  Speaker 1: You should be always thinking about adding value to your target audience.
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: That is the number one thing, in my opinion.
• 24:27
  Speaker 1: Now, before I let you go, there's a question that I ask all of my guests, and that question is what has been your biggest marketing lesson learned?
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: Because this show is called Imperfect Marketing, and we know marketing is anything but a perfect science.
• 24:43
  Speaker 2: Yeah, well, you know I was thinking about this because you were asking you was like I know I asked you this before and you might want to say the same or something slightly.
• 24:48
  Speaker 2: I could say something slightly different this time here too, and I'm going to speak on behalf of those of you out there who've been invited to be on a podcast or speak on a panel or be a part of an event and I hear this all the time like people would say I don't think I'm qualified or it makes me nervous to get up on stage or to do these things, being put into a position like today where Kendra asked me to come on her show.
• 25:10
  Speaker 2: You know I've been, I've done these interviews before, I'm comfortable doing them, but I remember being at that point where, the first time you are asked, you're like freaking out, like oh my gosh, I'm not ready for this.
• 25:18
  Speaker 2: And if you're asked to be in, speak on a panel, to be a speaker at an event or things like that, you have already been vetted Like in Kendra's eyes, I have already been vetted to be an expert quote unquote, I'm using error quotes right now to be on her show.
• 25:32
  Speaker 2: So take those as opportunities and then think that also helps to strengthen the relationship you have, you know, between Kendra and myself.
• 25:38
  Speaker 2: It's helping to strengthen, but it also helps you to get the word out there about you, about your organization, and I think that visibility is a really positive thing for you.
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: No, I think that that's fantastic.
• 25:50
  Speaker 1: Yeah, just do it.
• 25:51
  Speaker 1: Take the opportunity you.
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: We are so much harsher judges of ourselves than anybody else's because we're all so busy.
• 25:59
  Speaker 1: It's not that important Seriously, but let me ask you a question for anybody that's listening that would want to work with you or would want to connect with you.
• 26:08
  Speaker 1: How would they go about doing that?
• 26:11
  Speaker 2: Well, linkedin's my game, so you could certainly look me up on LinkedIn.
• 26:14
  Speaker 2: It's Brenda Meller, m-e-l-l-e-r.
• 26:17
  Speaker 2: Or you could go to my website, mellermarketingcom.
• 26:21
  Speaker 2: By the way, if you go to the homepage of my website, I've got a bunch of really cool free downloadable LinkedIn checklists that you could look at as well.
• 26:29
  Speaker 1: So we'll have links to Brenda's LinkedIn profile and, of course, her website and a lot of her great resources in the show notes in the YouTube description.
• 26:39
  Speaker 1: So no matter where you're listening or watching, you'll have access to that.
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: I strongly encourage everybody that's here to send Brenda a message.
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: Make sure that you connect with her, because she is a wealth of knowledge.
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: Her posts are fantastic.
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: I regularly reference her as an expert on LinkedIn with my clients and people that are talking to me that are looking to grow their business, because she knows what she's talking about.
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: And just to be able to get those and her emails, it's totally worth it.
• 27:11
  Speaker 1: One of the things that Brenda does suggest is, if you are going to connect with her, make sure that you do add a note, and if you're adding a note, make sure that you let her know that you saw her on the Imperfect Marketing podcast.
• 27:26
  Speaker 2: If I could add something in there too.
• 27:27
  Speaker 2: Kendra, yeah, when they visit my profile you just reminded me of this when they visited my profile I've got Creator Mode turned on, so my default button will be Follow.
• 27:34
  Speaker 2: If you want to connect with me, you can, but you've got to click on the More button or the Three Dots and from there you'll get that option to Personalize, invite or to Connect with me.
• 27:44
  Speaker 1: Thank you for that reminder.
• 27:45
  Speaker 1: So again, connect, follow whatever you'd like to do.
• 27:49
  Speaker 1: Again, she has a ton of information that she shares on a regular basis and I do strongly encourage that you connect with her.
• 27:57
  Speaker 1: Thank you again all for tuning in for another episode of Imperfect Marketing.
• 28:01
  Speaker 1: I hope you have a great rest of your day.